


A Shock to the System

by Raaj



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Plagg Cares, Sailor Moon References, adrien agreste watches anime to cope because who taught him healthy coping mechanisms NO ONE, but is also an angry little kwami right now, gabriel is hawkmoth, speculation on why adrien was chosen for the miraculous
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-22
Updated: 2017-07-22
Packaged: 2018-12-05 11:57:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11577612
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Raaj/pseuds/Raaj
Summary: When Plagg discovers who has been using Nooroo against the butterfly's will, the black cat kwami is so enraged that he winks out from existence.  His fury would have been too destructive if manifested.His chosen, having made the same discovery, holes up in his room.





	A Shock to the System

When Plagg discovers who has been using Nooroo against the butterfly's will, the black cat kwami is so enraged that he winks out from existence. His fury would have been too destructive if manifested.

Because his first thought had been, _it would be so easy._ There was his fellow kwami. There was the one holding him prisoner. All he would have needed to do is reach out one little paw with a good dose of Cataclysm. But no, no, there are rules about powers being wielded directly. And it would hurt Adrien. Because rules were made to be broken, but his cats tend to get hurt enough without his help.

Half of his fury is the frustration of a powerful spirit barred from smiting that one mortal who just needs to shuffle off the coil already. Half of his anger is a sense of betrayal from Master Fu. Because Adrien fulfills the most important qualification of a miraculous holder--providing tribute to his kwami--and the most important qualification of a Black Cat (after providing tribute, of course)--being unlucky. But Adrien is not much of a Black Cat outside of being unlucky. Most of Plagg's cats were crafty and conniving and knew how to wheedle as a cat should. After all, back when cats approached humans, they learned how to mimic the cries of babies to soften the humans' hearts. They learned to make humans love them, even worship them, so that they could get what they needed to survive. And yes, they came to love humans (mostly), but they made sure their needs were taken care of first. Adrien, by contrast, has all the innocence of the actual baby and none of the cat's guile to use that to his advantage. He charms people (hoo, boy) but only out of a desire to please, lacking the boldness to ask for what he needs.

Adrien is a terrible cat. Plagg hadn't minded that before now. Some kittens were a little slow to grow. He could teach them. Some Black Cats were chosen for other reasons besides suitability; Plagg had believed until now that Adrien was chosen as someone who would never misuse the power of destruction despite having to fight the butterfly, always indirect and frustrating its enemies for that. Because Adrien has shown, time and again, a great restraint for bearing bad luck and setbacks without taking it out on others. But if the true reason is that Fu had already known (suspected?) who had stolen Nooroo--

Plagg wants nothing more than to tell Adrien to get out of the manor, and then bring the whole thing down on Gabriel's head. Forget _rules_. Order is more Tikki's thing (And even she sometimes flexed rules in the interest of creation). Plagg is a god of destruction and chaos. Only thing stopping him is the certain knowledge: there is no way to destroy Gabriel Agreste without destroying Adrien.

Love is such a sickening thing sometimes. It can be a tool of creation, but it can also be a tool of destruction, and it's one of the few that Plagg has no control over. Master Fu knows that. He _hates_ that Master Fu knows that.

...He has to let the anger go, though. He can't satisfy it (sadly) and he can't hold onto it. He needs to go back to the physical world. He's not the only one who glimpsed Hawkmoth detransforming.

Plagg manifests into Adrien's room and nearly doesn't recognize it. The thick curtains are drawn closed to block out the sun and the lights are off. It's easy to spot Adrien, though, because there is one source of light, the huge television, and Adrien is hunched in his chair in front of it with a blanket draped over him. He's watching some animated show with a bunch of girls; Plagg knows he's seen it being played before, but it wasn't important enough to remember then and it definitely isn't now.

"Hey, kid."

Adrien starts, sitting up straighter in an instant and whipping his head around to look at the kwami. Even with only the pale blue light from the television, it's easy to see there are tear tracks on the kid's face. He's really not looking like a model right now. "Plagg?"

The disbelief in Adrien's voice nearly smacks Plagg out of the air. The kid's _surprised_ that he's back. The kid thought-- his kitten thought...

Well, of course he thought. Cats are smart and will learn hard lessons, like being abandoned for things that aren't their fault.

Plagg knows he should say something kind. Tikki would say something kind. Tikki would say something kind, and patient, and understanding, and wise. Tikki knows how to be loving. Tikki's all on the love train.

Plagg says "duh" and settles down by the crook of Adrien's neck, pausing just long enough on the way down to headbutt the kid's chin. Then he nestles down into the fabric of the scarf that Adrien is wearing. He wonders, for a split second, if Adrien is physically ill from the shock--both a blanket and a scarf?--and then he realizes he remembers the texture of this scarf. It's the one Adrien got for his birthday. The one he was sooo thrilled to get, because it meant his father had put in more thought than just buying another overpriced pen.

The black cat kwami closes his eyes and purrs. He can purr very loudly for his size (he _is_ a god) and does just that, vibrating his whole body so much that if he wasn't secure in the fabric he'd probably slide right off Adrien's shoulder. And maybe the kid's worried that'll happen anyway, because after a moment Plagg can feel a hand cupping over him. Two fingers scratch his head. The kid's shaking a little, but it seems like he got most of his crying done earlier.

The show keeps playing. There's fighting, and there's girls yelling about fighting in the name of love and never giving up, so this is obviously one of those magical girl shows that Adrien loves. Plagg finds them corny enough to gag on, but maybe the whole 'never give up' spiel is exactly what Adrien needs to hear right now. He tunes it back out and keeps purring.

He doesn't know how Adrien is going to keep being Chat Noir now. If Master Fu selected Hawkmoth's son on purpose, he's an idiot, Plagg's already decided. He might have chosen Adrien so that the black cat wouldn't go too far, or he might have picked Adrien so that the butterfly would hesitate in manipulating the black cat, but that all means squat if the black cat just loses the will to fight.

But maybe...there is the possibility that this is all a coincidence, part of the bad luck that gave Adrien the potential to be one of his cats in the first place. That really doesn't make Plagg feel any better, so he pushes that thought off his mental shelf and keeps on purring.

Round 2 of that line of thought: sometimes the trials that make his cats prove their greatness are the same ones that break them. Back off the shelf.

He's purring so strongly in his agitation that Adrien pauses in scratching his head with a quiet "hey". Plagg stops as soon as he realizes he's worried the kid, but the lull between them seems to be broken anyway when Adrien goes on talking.

"...You know, I always liked Sailor Moon, even before I got the whole magical transformation myself." Adrien ends that comment with an empty laugh, and Plagg takes a glimpse at his face to see the kid looking at the tv with a dreamy, lost expression. "But...afterward, too. It's not the first of its genre, but it's a classic. And the villains are a lot like Hawkmoth, attacking indirectly until the very end. They make akuma too, though sometimes it's just objects they transform, not people. It's only people sometimes." Adrien shrugs, though it's a very small gesture, mindful of the kwami on him. "Sometimes it doesn't seem like either side is making any progress at all until something drastic happens. I always thought it was a good reminder that Ladybug and I need to stay on our toes in case a game-changer happens. But also that we need to enjoy the little moments along the way, like how a lot of the episodes are really about the senshi and their friendship." Plagg snorts at how cliche that is, but feels bad for it when Adrien says, "Yeah, I know."

"They're not _wrong_ ," the kwami offers. A lot of cliches become so because they rang true to people. "You know I always enjoy the little things. Like little pieces of camembert. Of course, big wheels of camembert are acceptable too!"

That provokes a more genuine reaction from Adrien, a wrinkle of his nose as he looks down at Plagg. "Friendship is not like cheese."

"You're right. Cheese is better," Plagg declares, but he pops up from Adrien's shoulder to let the kid know he's got his attention. "Okay. So...what? You think this show's like your life because the villains have the same m.o.?" He's not sure why the kid's trying to talk to him about a genre he has proclaimed distaste for on many occasions, but between the options of talking about this, talking about uncomfortable things like how Plagg would like to use a Cataclysm on Agreste Sr, or not talking at all, sure. Magical girl shows it is.

"Well, there's a sailor scout of destruction and rebirth, which I thought was interesting. Though, rebirth sounds more like Ladybug's thing."

Personally, Plagg thinks that sounds closest to what happens when the Ladybug and Black Cat Miraculouses are combined, but hey, there are times to dump potentially volatile information and this is not one of them! Instead he peers up at the characters on the screen--there's a _lot_ of girls, and then there's one baby for some reason--trying to discern which one would make a good cat. From everything he's gleaned from this show over time, which is not that much, he hopes, most of the characters are out automatically just for not being all that clever. "Still a girl though, right?"

"Yeah. She's the baby, actually. She was reborn after using her power."

...Ah. Makes sense. Maybe. As far as Adrien's shows make sense.

"Her father was one of the villains this season."

"Oh," Plagg says, because that's all he's got right now. They _are_ talking about uncomfortable things, then, just under the guise of pretty power make-up or whatever it is.

"He's always so cold and distant, and it's really terrible what he does to people," Adrien says. "There's no...there's no excusing what he does. And in the manga, he really is a monster to the end. He...dies...his daughter realizes she already lost him a long time ago, when her mother died."

Adrien falls quiet. The baby's been gone from the screen for a couple minutes now; the current scene's focused on a young girl. Plagg is trying to think of something to say that is _not_ "sounds about right."

If Master Fu chose Adrien knowing he was Hawkmoth's son, Plagg is going to revolt. He doesn't know how yet, but he will. There is 'unfair', and Plagg can deal with unfair because what else is luck and chance besides the element of unfairness? Good luck, bad luck, either way it means what you get out of life isn't always equal to what you put into it. Unfair, he can deal with, it's the black cat's lot. There is being dealt a bad hand, and there is being conned by the dealer. You make the best of the first one and you make sure to get even for the second.

On screen, after some weird lady (another sailor senshi, Plagg's sure, but who cares) appearing and talking to the young girl, the girl starts running down the hill. That's when Adrien continues. "In this version...he was possessed by the real monster. He loved his daughter all along, and Sailor Moon is able to save both of them."

The baby's back on-screen, cradled by a white-haired man with glasses who's bandaged up, stuck in a wheelchair, but looking like he's on the road to recovery rather than falling ill. The sailor senshi of destruction, reunited with a father who always loved her and never meant to hurt her or anyone else. A picture of innocence.

It does not take a genius to see which version Adrien hopes is closer to his situation. And Plagg wants to say sure, Ladybug will just wrap Hawkmoth up with the yo-yo and give him a good de-evilizing, but you can't purge evil out of someone who welcomed it. Can't exorcise what's not possessed. "...I wish I could say your dad really is possessed, kid, but if he is it's nothing I can sense. Nooroo's better with stuff like that, once he's free we could ask him, but we'd have to _free_ him first, and that means--"

The blanket around Adrien whips down so fast that Plagg phases intangible for a moment, though it wouldn't have hit him anyway. Adrien's not like that. What he is is scared and shaking, visible even in the dim room and with the blanket covering him. "I know! I know what it means! Just...don't...don't say it."

If Tikki were here, she would know all the things to say to help calm Adrien. She might even know a hope to give him that's a _little_ more stable than one from his animated shows. Plagg doesn't know that. Plagg, being a kwami of destruction, knows all the things to _not_ say, all the swipes and digs he could make to show Adrien he's clinging to a fantasy. Like how unrealistic it is. Like how the public will probably still hold his father accountable for his actions in the end, if it comes out that Gabriel is Hawkmoth. Like how black cats are known for their bad luck, with the lucky breaks usually being Ladybug's gig. Like how that scarf Adrien is clinging to as a proof of his father's love came out of the box smelling faintly like a bakery.

He knows all the things to say to tear Adrien down, and nothing he can do to actually help him. So he phases intangible again to pass under the blanket again, and this time he swoops down to Adrien's lap since the boy's shoulders are shaking too badly with fresh sobs to land on. Plagg curls up in his kitten's lap, and he purrs. He purrs for all he is worth. He knows it's not enough. There's one rule that he's going to have to break, that he didn't care about in the first place and will now absolutely shatter first chance he gets. He needs to bring Tikki and her chosen in on this. Even if it means leaking identities. There's no way he can keep Adrien together on his own, and a good cat will always get what they need. He needs help.


End file.
